Rockford transformation good so far; hard part comes this spring

Sunday

Jan 5, 2014 at 4:00 PM

I was hurrying to get to the second public Transform Rockford meeting at Ellis Elementary School.

It was 12:40 p.m. on Dec. 14. The meeting of the group that aims to turn Rockford - deeply troubled by crime, poverty and joblessness - into a top city by 2025 was set to start at 1 p.m. I was to write a story about the event, and I didn't want to miss a thing.

I had my iPhone next to me in my vehicle, open to the map the group had provided on its website to get to the school. Part of West State Street was still closed for road construction, and Transform Rockford had detailed alternate routes. Good thinking on their part, I thought.

But I don't read maps as well as I'd like. And just when I was considering parking my car off North Central Avenue and hoofing it in the cold to the school at 222 S. Central Ave., a simple white sign saved me.

It read "Transform Rockford" and had an arrow pointing me and others in the right direction. Two or three similar, professionally made signs positioned along other streets got me there with minutes to spare. How competent, I thought.

When I got to the school door, two beaming students wearing T-shirts with the school's name each eagerly handed me a piece of paper. It listed seven meetings Transform Rockford has set up this month at churches and community centers, at which area residents can join in creating a vision for how to turn Rockford around. How charming and fitting for the kids of the city's future to be so enthusiastically involved, I thought.

Once inside, volunteers stationed behind cafeteria-style tables not only greeted the 1,000 attendees and checked names off of those who'd said they'd be there, they also made sure they got contact information for those who weren't already on their lists. How detailed and organized, I thought.

The half dozen or so Transform Rockford members who spoke on the auditorium stage about their research into how various top-tier cities compare with here were well-informed and briefly communicated their findings with confidence. How impressive, I thought.

When it came to questions and comments at the microphone from the audience, Transform Rockford leaders provided adequate time and actively listened. How respectful, I thought.

Transform Rockford's first public meeting, at which attendees heard the "brutal facts" about the city, was held in November at the Coronado Performing Arts Center and drew 1,400 people. How encouraging, I thought, about the attendance there and at Ellis.

Now the really hard part starts for Transform Rockford: getting virtually everybody from all walks of life to agree on strategies to make the Rockford area an enviable place to live, work and play. Mike Schablaske, executive director of the group, has said he expects strategies to be forthcoming this spring.

I'll be watching and writing about practically every step along the way, and I can hardly wait for the long process to start showing results.